Half of R/sales cold email posts in 2026 were written by people selling it

An analysis of cold-email discussions in r/sales finds that the sharp rise in 2026 conversation came largely from people marketing cold-email services, tools, or advice - not from sales practitioners. Of 250 posts naming cold email from January through September, 125 were classified as promotional, a 50% share. That compares with 16.7% in 2024 and 28.8% in 2025. Promotional posts were written by 108 different accounts, so the increase was not driven by one prolific advertiser. Practitioner posts remained broadly steady: 122 in the first nine months of 2026, roughly on pace with the 160-190 annual total seen since 2022. The central argument is that Reddit’s apparent cold-email boom reflects a growing market of people selling the “shovels,” rather than a comparable surge in practitioners discussing the channel.

The analysis classified titles and opening lines for 1,304 r/sales posts mentioning cold email between 2021 and September 2026, using categories for promotion, practitioner discussion, and other material. Researchers also examined cold-calling posts, where promotional content rose less sharply - from 8% in 2024 to 14% in 2026 - and activity remained dominated by practitioners. In r/b2bmarketing, cold-email posts jumped from 25 in 2024 to 276 in the first nine months of 2026, with 54% classified as promotional. Classification relied on an AI model, with a small hand-check finding about 2% disagreement. The figures measure discussion and promotional intent, not whether cold email works; the analysis also comes from a company that sells cold-email campaigns.